Kriste Smith gets $10k for North Royalton

Schools that work well, do so because they have a few teachers like Kriste.  North Royalton tends to have a lot of them, even though the administration doesn’t know or care. 

During my last year at Royalton, Kriste and I powered walked around the school during our 10th period free time.  Superficially, I have almost nothing in common with Kriste, but we could talk for hours.  She feels the same duty to her students, and is deeply committed to North Royalton.

Kriste was a counselor for years, but when the opportunity presented itself, she moved back to the classroom to teach business classes.  As she built up the program, she was continually blocked by administration in her efforts to get books and resources to improve the student experience.  There were times when she was on the verge of tears because of the callous way the administration ignored her requests.

Administrators like to think that they have a vision for the school, and just need to manipulate the puppets to make it a reality.  It doesn’t work that way.  A good administration sees the teaching staff as talent, that can be nurtured and developed.  Kriste Smith is an indefatigable teacher with a huge heart.  No teacher gets everything they want, but Kriste always deserves to be heard and a smart administrator would help her in any way possible.

I haven’t talked to Kriste about this grant, but it looks like the administration wasn’t giving her the support she needed to do the best for her students.  She looked for other avenues to get there.